The article detailing a “green solution” to diverting food waste from the dining halls at Colorado State University missed a major point. There is no mention of the most basic environmental solution that is so often overlooked in our discussions of water shortages and landfill problems: How about not wasting the food, or water, in the first place?

Why would a student (a biology major!) throw out an “egg and three strips of bacon” and “feel good” about it because the waste is not going to a landfill? Maybe the wisest, and cheapest, step the CSU dining halls could take is to remind students and guests to “only take what you will eat.” Imagine how much money would be saved if no food was wasted at all.

The technology would still be useful for inevitable food waste, e.g., some vegetable skins, banana peels and eggshells.

Cathy Wanstrath, Denver

This letter was published in the Feb. 21 edition.

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